Cult Tactics: The Art of Recruitment and Retention
You didn’t wake up one day and decide to join a cult.
That’s the thing - no one does.
Most people think cults are obvious: remote compounds, matching outfits, and a charismatic leader surrounded by unquestioning followers. But the truth is far more mundane, and far more dangerous.
High-control religious groups often look like ordinary churches and community groups (because not all cults are religious – mine just happened to be). Their pastors wear skinny jeans, the band plays Coldplay-sounding worship songs, and the foyer smells like espresso. But behind the lights, language, and love bombing is a carefully engineered system of psychological control.
And I know this not just because I studied it, but because I survived it.
In Holy Hell: Saved So Hard I Needed Therapy, I write about the 34 years I spent inside high-demand evangelical churches, including 11 years in a megachurch that slowly consumed my identity, autonomy, and voice. From the outside, it looked like I had it all together: leadership roles, teaching gigs, a “calling.” On the inside, I was burnt out, spiritually manipulated, and gaslit into submission.
High-Control Groups Don’t Look Like Cults - Until They Do
The most effective high-control groups don’t advertise themselves as dangerous. They present as vibrant, purpose-filled, world-changing communities.
They speak the language of healing, family, and destiny:
“God brought you here for a reason.”
“You’ve got a big calling on your life.”
“This house will unlock your potential.”
At 16, I was that person looking for purpose. I didn’t think I was being recruited; I thought I was being saved. They told me God had “set me apart” and “called me into leadership.” And when you’re young, earnest, and desperately trying to make sense of yourself and the world, that doesn’t feel like coercion - it feels like hope.
And that’s what makes it so effective.
Recruitment isn’t random. It’s calculated. It targets our most human needs: connection, belonging, clarity, and identity. But the truth is, for many of us, the recruitment started long before we were ever old enough to say yes or no.
This isn’t just about adult manipulation. This is about childhood indoctrination.
I wasn’t handed my first Bible study at 16, I was already steeped in the world of Bible memory verses, youth camp altar calls, and flannelgraph Jesus long before I even knew what the word “indoctrination” meant.
From a young age, I was taught that obedience equals blessing, that questioning is rebellion, and that doubt is dangerous. I learned to suppress critical thinking in the name of “faith,” to override my instincts because “the heart is deceitful,” and to see suffering as divine testing.
Every story, every scripture, every spiritual metaphor was loaded with binary thinking:
Good vs. evil
Righteous vs. sinful
Us vs. them
This early indoctrination laid the groundwork for the high-control environment I walked into later. It trained me to trust authority over intuition. To submit before I understood. To fear consequences more than I valued freedom.
What we often call “faith formation” in high-control environments is identity erasure masked as spiritual development. You’re not encouraged to become yourself; you’re taught to become the version of you the system finds most useful.
And when that starts in childhood, it becomes the lens through which you see everything. Including yourself.
Love Bombing: When Acceptance Becomes a Hook
The first tactic is usually love bombing. On the surface, it looks like radical inclusion, generous hospitality, even divine favour. But underneath, it’s a fast-track into enmeshment - a strategic overwhelm of attention, affection, and affirmation designed to disarm your inner caution and pull you in.
I still remember my first few months in the megachurch. People greeted me with wide-eyed warmth. I was called “anointed” before anyone actually knew me. I was told, “We’ve been praying for someone like you,” as if my arrival had been prophesied. They didn’t just welcome me, they celebrated me.
Every interaction was laced with spiritual significance:
“There’s such a strong call on your life.”
“I can already see you leading a ministry.”
“God is going to use you in powerful ways.”
When you’ve spent your life quietly wondering if you’re too much or not enough, this kind of affirmation hits hard. It feels healing. Holy, even.
You’re encouraged to take on more “We see leadership in you.”
You’re elevated quickly “You carry such a servant’s heart.”
You’re invited into rooms that feel exclusive “Not everyone is ready for this level of calling.”
Before I knew it, I was volunteering at every event, planning rosters, organising gatherings. I hadn’t asked for any of it. But saying no felt like resisting what God was “clearly doing” in my life.
This is how love bombing works:
It doesn’t ask. It anoints.
It doesn’t nurture consent. It manufactures calling.
It doesn’t build relationships. It builds obligation dressed up as opportunity.
It’s intoxicating. It bypasses your critical thinking by activating your emotional hunger.
You’ve found your people. Your place. Your purpose. But it’s not real connection, it’s scripted, and it’s conditional.
Love bombing fast-forwards intimacy in ways that can feel spiritual or even magical at the time. You’re showered with praise, included in the inner circle, and made to feel spiritually special, sometimes even superior. But all of it is happening before you’ve had the chance to observe, build trust, or choose at your own pace.
You’re not bonding. You’re being captured.
And then, quietly, subtly, the temperature shifts.
Suddenly:
You’re expected to show up early and stay late.
You’re gently rebuked for missing a midweek meeting.
You’re pulled aside and told, “Serving is a privilege, not a right.”
You’re asked to give more, show up more, prove yourself more; because, after all, “God gave you these gifts to use for His house.”
What started as celebration becomes expectation. What started as empowerment becomes pressure.
You begin adjusting your life around church.
You cancel holidays for conferences.
You skip family events for team nights.
You feel guilty saying no, even when you’re exhausted or struggling.
And slowly, without realising it, your world starts to shrink.
You stop making plans with old friends.
You filter your conversations through church-approved language.
You second-guess your own needs and limits.
You convince yourself that burnout is just “dying to self.”
It doesn’t happen all at once. That’s the trick.
By the time you notice how deep you’re in, you’ve already built your entire social, spiritual, and emotional identity inside the system. Leaving feels ungrateful. Questioning feels like betrayal. Resting feels like failure.
And the most confusing part? You still feel loved.
Because they still tell you:
“We’re for you.”
“We see so much potential in you.”
“The enemy attacks those with big callings.”
It’s a trap cloaked in tenderness.
Love bombing is not genuine love. It’s strategic emotional flooding designed to bind you to the system before you know what’s happening.
Performance, Pressure, and the Fear of Falling Behind
One of the most manipulative tactics used in high-control churches is spiritualised performance. You’re praised for being busy. Hustle becomes holy. I was told multiple times, “God gives platforms to the faithful.” And I believed it.
So, I ran myself into the ground:
14-hour Sundays.
Multiple midweek meetings.
Volunteer leadership.
Weekend conferences.
Staff events - unpaid and expected.
When I look back, I realise I was never resting. I was proving. Performing. Hoping to earn the approval of a system that said all the right things but treated people like disposable tools. And when I started to burn out, I was told it was a “spiritual attack.” That I just needed to pray more. Fast more. Read more scripture.
Loyalty Over Logic: The Slow Death of Autonomy
High-control religious systems create an ecosystem where loyalty matters more than logic. Questioning the system becomes framed as rebellion. You’re warned about the “spirit of Jezebel” or the “sin of offense.” You’re told to guard your heart, not speak negatively, and “stay planted.”
I lost count of how many times I heard:
“Don’t touch God’s anointed.”
“Rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft.”
“If you’re uncomfortable, it’s probably conviction.”
So, I doubted myself instead of the system.
Even when my gut screamed that something was off, I silenced it in the name of submission.
Why It’s So Hard to Leave
By the time you start waking up to the manipulation, you’ve built your entire life inside the system.
Your social circle? Church.
Your purpose? Ministry.
Your job? Probably under the church umbrella.
Your identity? Entangled in roles like “faithful wife,” “servant leader,” “spiritual mother.”
Leaving doesn’t just feel hard; it feels like self-destruction.
I remember lying awake at night, terrified I was walking away from God. Terrified I was trading “truth” for deception. Terrified I would go to hell. And yet, somewhere deep in my bones, I knew: staying would destroy me.
Grieving the Loss of a False Self
After leaving, I entered what I can only describe as an existential free fall. I had no idea who I was outside of church. I was used to being the one with answers. Now I had nothing but questions.
And that grief? It doesn’t always look dramatic. Sometimes it looks like numbness. Sometimes rage. Sometimes you just cry in the car because a worship song triggers you in the supermarket aisle.
But here’s the thing: that grief is proof you’re waking up.
Red Flags You Were Recruited Into a High-Control Group
If you’re unsure whether what you experienced was abusive, consider:
Were doubts met with spiritual warnings?
Were you discouraged from reading “outside material” or listening to “outside media”?
Did you feel pressure to serve, give, or perform to stay accepted?
Were former members demonised or cut off?
Did leaders claim exclusive access to truth or divine insight?
If any of this sounds familiar, you may have been in a high-control environment.
What Recovery Can Look Like
Recovery isn’t linear. Some days, you’ll feel empowered. Other days, you’ll question everything. That’s normal.
Here’s what helped me:
Therapy (especially with a trauma-informed practitioner that understood religious trauma)
Writing my story (Holy Hell: Saved So Hard I Needed Therapy was both exorcism and reclamation)
Finding a community where my whole self was welcomed
Reconnecting with my body through somatic practices
Giving myself permission to not “have it all figured out”⠀
You’re Not Alone - And You’re Not Broken
If you’ve been through this, know this:
You’re not dramatic.
You’re not overreacting.
You’re not broken.
You were manipulated. And now you’re waking up.
That’s courage. That’s healing. That’s sacred.
Healing Doesn’t Happen in Isolation
At The Religious Trauma Collective Online Event, we hosted a powerful panel called “Cult Conversations”, where survivors and experts broke down the layered psychology of recruitment, control, and retention.
These conversations are vital. Not just for validation, but for liberation.
Because when you realise you were never crazy, you were conditioned, it changes everything.⠀
If this blog speaks to your experience, or someone you love’s, The Religious Trauma Collective Online Event is for you. Grab your All Access Pass here to watch the Cult Conversation, along with dozens of other sessions on purity culture, spiritual abuse, clergy misconduct, nervous system healing, and more.
You deserve to reclaim your story.
You deserve to heal on your terms.
And no matter how far gone you feel, you’re already on your way back to yourself.